. I hurriedly and quietly explained this to Marchmont.

"Bosh! Look here! You tell him that I want to buy those birds, and will
give him a sovereign each for them."

"I shall do no such thing. I know what I am talking about, and you
don't. Fifty sovereigns would not buy those birds--so don't say anything
more on the subject. If you do, you will give offence--and these Samoans
are very touchy."

"Bah--that's all bosh, my dear fellow. Any way, I'll give five pounds
for the pair," and to my horror, and before I could stay him, he took
out five sovereigns, and "skidded" them along the matted floor towards
the chief, a particularly irascible young man named Asi (Sandalwood).

"There, my friend, are five good English sovereigns for your birds. I
suppose I can trust you to send them to the English Consul at Apia for
me. Eh?"

There was a dead silence. Asi spoke English perfectly, but hitherto, out
of politeness, had only addressed me in Samoan. His eyes flashed with
quick anger at Marchmont, then he looked at me reproachfully, made a
sign to the custodian of the birds, and rising proudly to his feet, said
to me in Samoan:--

"I will drink kava with you alone, friend. Will you come to my own
house," and he motioned me to precede him. Never before had I seen
a naturally passionate man exhibit such a sense of dignity and
self-restraint under what was, to him, a stupid insult.

I turned to Marchmont: "Look what you have done, confound you for an
ass! If you are beginning this way in Samoa you will get yourself into
no end of trouble. Have you no sense?"

"I have sense enough to see that you are making a lot of fuss over
nothing. Tell the beastly savage that he can keep his wretched birds. I
would only have wrung their necks and had them cooked."

The young warrior who held the cage, set it down, and striding up beside
the Man Who Knew Everything dealt him an open-handed back-hand blow
on the side of the head--a favourite trick of Samoan wrestlers and
fighters--and Marchmont went down upon the matted floor with a smash.
I thought he was killed--he lay so motionless--and in an instant there
flashed across my memory a story told to me by a medical missionary
in Samoa, of how one of these terrific back-handed "smacks" dealt by a
native had broken a man's neck.

However, in a few minutes, Marchmont recovered, and rose to his feet,
spoiling for a fight The natives regarded him with a sullen but assumed
indifference, and drew